Damage
by Lady Elya
Summary: Because, at the end of the day, somebody has to pay the butcher's bill. Sakura dreams. One shot.


**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto**

**I'm not really proud of the first part of the story, I wrote it a few months ago, and I think the second part is written much better. But the first part was where I got the idea so I didn't want to change it much. **

**On to the story!**

Drip drip drip

Hello? Is anybody there?

Drip drip drip

What is that sound?

Drip drip drip

Where... am I?

At first I saw only blackness. Everything was black, that horrible black you can't help but fear. And even if you tell yourself that there is no reason for it, that irrational fright still creeps up on you. It was the blackness of that place under your bed, of dark tombstones and graveyards at night. It was not the absence of light, no, it was an entity all by itself. And it was everywhere around me.

It was suffocating me, squeezing me from all sides. Overwhelming me. It was thick, and strong, and all I wanted was to run away from it. But it was everywhere. I tried looking around, searching for a light. Yearning for it. I needed only a small flicker of a candle flame or a glowing light of a campfire from far away. Anything to break the thick veil of darkness around me. There was nothing.

Then, I felt something shift. I didn't know what exactly happened, but something was definitely different. I looked and I saw a light. I could feel a strong sense of relief. The strong hold darkness had on me loosened, and I could breathe again.

The light suddenly started coming towards me. It was bright, so bright and it wasn't stopping. It blinded me. Again I couldn't see anything. But it was so different from before. The darkness was blunt and cold and sticky. The light was burning so sharply, igniting a fire deep inside me. Destroying everything and still not stopping. Trying to burn me whole.

Eventually the light started to wane and I could finally see again. I took in my surroundings. I was in a bathroom. It was a bit small, but had everything a bathroom should have. Only, something about it tickled my memory. It was awfully familiar. I tried to remember where I had seen it before, but I couldn't. Something flickered through my mind, but it was lost before I realized what it was.

Then I heard a noise. It was the creak of an opening door. A girl entered the bathroom.

She had a small, lithe body. A white, buckle-up skirt covered the top part of her legs, and ended mid-tight. Under the skirt, she had black, spandex shorts. Several pouches were around her waist and on her legs. Some were closed, but in the open ones I could see some sharp weapons. She wore a red shirt with a white circle on the back.

She had shoulder length red hair. It was the color of blood, the exact same shade. A headband kept her bangs from her eyes. She had high cheekbones, pink lips and crimson red eyes, with flickers of green.

Her face was emotionless, but there was a dept in her eyes that I couldn't place. Some emotion that I couldn't recognize. She looked right at me, and for a split second I expected her to say something, but she just continued on.

She couldn't see me.

She was uneasily familiar. I knew the sway of that hair, I knew the tilt of her eyebrows, those pearl like teeth, those eyes. I was sure I had seen those facial features, her whole figure somewhere else already. And she wasn't something only familiar, she was something known. A name swam through the air, curled itself around her, around me, almost became corporeal. And disappeared.

The girl slowly took off her clothes and entered the shower. She didn't look into the mirror even once, didn't even glance at it. If only I knew (remembered) her name.

Steam rose from the water. The girl grasped a shampoo and started washing her hair. At first everything seemed normal, but then the water suddenly began to turn crimson. Little red drops fell on the white tiles and glass shower door. The metallic smell of blood filled the air.

The girl continued, like it was nothing. I wanted to scream, to tell her to stop, to warn her about the blood, but I couldn't. I could only observe. Then I looked into the girl's eyes, and saw them bleeding. I was shocked. Blood was also pouring from her hair. I saw hints of pink in the red strands.

As more blood poured, I realized she wasn't bleeding from her head. Her hair was soaked in blood and it was washing out. All that time, the girl acted like she didn't notice anything, like everything was normal. I looked into her eyes. They also weren't bleeding. The blood changed their natural color, and now it was pouring from them.

The now pink-haired, green eyes girl turned the shower tap off. She looked up right at me with those big, doe-like, forest-green eyes. They were filled with hate and loathing. I suddenly remembered who she was. _She was me!_

And she (I?) uttered one word that shocked me, but at the same time I somehow already knew that she would say it.

"Murderer!"

And the scene shifted.

She sheaths the black katana, thick, red liquid dripping from the blade. A body falls to the ground with a hollow thud. Her face, expressionless through the killing, slowly splits into a smile.

It isn't a content smile, a smile of careless, peaceful mornings, finished missions, and bright, white smoke slowly drifting from a campfire. It isn't a happy smile, an effortless quirk of the lips, that makes eyes crinkle in the corners and cheeks flush. Nor is it a sad smile, the one that is breathtakingly beautiful and heartbreakingly selfless. It is not any of those smiles, not a smile that should grace the face of a girl such as her.

No, this smile is something else. It is feral, uncontrolled. A grin, it could be called, although a grin doesn't convey these kinds of feelings. It is frightening for some, because that smile usually means death. It is that kind of smile, a smile that could be the last thing you see. For some it brings shame, because it is a manifestation of the feelings that are best left buried deep inside, locked in a small box and left, if not destroyed. Feelings that should be hidden, forgotten.

That simple show of teeth says so much. It tells of countless deaths, of blood dripping, of voices screaming. It is frightening, but it lures you in. It makes you wonder what it means to smile like that, how it feels. It leaves you breathless.

She isn't aware that she is smiling.

The simplest explanation of that smile is that it is passionate. It conveys a passion for killing, thirst for blood. Want for more. At the surface, it is controlled, ruthless. But deeper down, there are hints of madness, and that is frightening most of all.

The smile doesn't reach her eyes. Those kinds of smiles never do. Her eyes are left empty. Because eyes are said to be the mirrors of the soul. And her soul is frayed around the edges, and was shattered again and again, that barely a sliver of it is left, if nothing at all.

She slowly turns around, surveys the battlefield. The small clearing she is standing in is illuminated with the light of the setting sun. The corpses of men litter the ground around her. One of them was her mission, she isn't sure which one. Just another nameless, faceless person, sentenced to death. And the others, oh, they are only collateral.

Mission finished, she turns around and heads home. And if she kills some bandits along the way, the ones unfortunate enough to be in her path, it doesn't matter. Nobody will know, right? She did it to sate her bloodlust and, after all, shinobi are supposed to kill. They are made for it, they train for it. So what if she kills outside her mission. Nobody will judge her for it, right?

And even if they do, she won't care. (or she'll just kill them)

She comes to her village. To her home. Nobody greets her on the street. Nobody even glances at her. And she doesn't even notice, because that is her life. A small, deeply buried part of her chokingly whispers that it is wrong, that it isn't supposed to be like this. But she ignores it.

She isn't a perfect shinobi. Because even if she doesn't feel a lot, bloodlust courses through her veins daily. And shinobi should be emotionless, perfect weapons. But bloodlust is an emotion that is accepted, even encouraged in some. So even if she doesn't have textbook perfection, she is good enough.

But she is past caring for that. (except for that small part of her that is urging her to stop, to think, to feel)

She trains, eats and sleeps, and drowns herself in the repetition. She reads, but only rarely, because then she is confronted with things such as remorse, friendship, happiness. Love. So many words that she should know the meaning of, but she doesn't, and if she knew fear, she would be afraid. Except she isn't. (but she still stops reading)

Training becomes everything to her. She must have had friends once, but she doesn't remember. Her whole life became a blur at one point. And if she doesn't recall what happened before, so what? Why does it matter?

(that little rebellious part of her brain wants to fight what she has become, but it is too small and too weak, and she is trained too well. and why should she fight if she is content?)

She dreams only of battlefields, or she doesn't dream at all. Sometimes, at that fluttering edge of sleep, where reality and dreams collide, she remembers feeling weak. But that was long ago, and she forgets so easily. And she isn't weak. She hones her body to be perfect, and it's hard to remember the time when all she needed was protection when right now she is so different.

There is a picture on her nightstand. It meant so much to her once, but now when she looks at it, she doesn't feel a thing. There is no crushing sadness, no sense of loss. And soon the picture fades into the room, becomes just another part of the wallpaper. Her eyes start passing over it when she looks around.

She doesn't remember what tears are, what they feel like. Perhaps they are like blood, only more innocent. More divine. They mean something that she cannot grasp, not anymore. But blood means life, and she doesn't mind that it is the only liquid she feels on her face. In some ways, it makes her want to kill even more.

She accepts only solo missions, says that she works the best alone. She argues that her strengths are as an assassin, that there are much better medics than her, and soon she stops getting request for a team medic. Soon she doesn't even need to argue anymore.

Her superiors begin to whisper about her, but because she finishes every mission without a hitch, they can't afford to reevaluate her. And she pushed everyone away, so nobody actually knows her. There are some who remember her from before, who can't believe what she's become. But they are few and in between, and she brushes them off easily.

She is careful that nobody sees her on the battlefield.

She gets another mission. An assassination one, again. Excitement stirs inside her, but she squashes it. Still, she can't erase impatience, because killing is slowly becoming a craving, and she can't control it. She doesn't want to.

So she fights and she injures and she kills. She jumps and she dodges and she kills. She sees lives flicker and die in front of her, because of her. There is no remorse. Why should she feel sorry over what she does if she likes it? And if she has lost her conscience somewhere along the way, so what? At least she is content. (maybe)

She becomes a perfect, killing machine. Even more than perfect, because she likes it. That small part of her screams.

She screams herself awake.

**A/N: Thank you for reading, I hope you liked it! Please review and tell me what you think! Also, if you find any mistakes, please tell me.**


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